[slothtrop]

As I recall, for this particular bit of research that I read a couple of months ago, more precisely it states there is no clear discernible level of consumption that could be deemed "safe". That's not really a surprise if you look at the data because it's such a mess. You also can't pin a point at which consumption is a high risk. What does that tell us?

You can however surmise that low / moderate consumption is not associated with high risk of mortality. There is "risk" insofar as it is non-null, anything above zero is unsafe. So what? That doesn't mean it's significant.

edit: this appears to criticize the paper - https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/articl...

[allturtles]

Exactly. I find the claim "no level of alcohol consumption is safe" hyperbolic. You could claim with far more justification that "no amount of driving is safe" since you could be killed pulling out of your driveway but I think most people who drive on a daily basis would find this claim odd. "safety" is a relative, not an absolute condition, since in some sense being alive is unsafe.

[AlwaysRock]

This is a pretty odd comparison.

Some amount of food/caloric intake is healthy or required. Too much is bad. Some amount of water intake is healthy or required. Too much is bad.

No amount of arsenic intake is healthy or required. Any is bad. No amount of alcohol intake is healthy or required. Any is bad.

Too much of many things is bad. Any amount of some things is bad.

Safe may be an odd term for it but alcohols impact on ones health is always a negative. If we define bad as a negative effect on ones health it may be a better term than safe here.

[allturtles]

Arsenic is in all kinds of foods, if you made the claim "no amount of arsenic consumption is safe", you would be arguing that basically everyone's diet is unsafe. What does that even mean?

To take the claim "no amount of alcohol consumption is safe" seriously would mean you shouldn't eat bread, which contains a small amount of alcohol.

[tomtheelder]

> To take the claim "no amount of alcohol consumption is safe" seriously would mean you shouldn't eat bread, which contains a small amount of alcohol.

No, it doesn't mean this. What they mean is that any amount of alcohol consumption causes some amount of harm. From the research I have seen it seems to be more or less linear. Minuscule consumption means minimal harm.

The implication isn't that you or anyone else should necessarily reduce your consumption to zero. It's that it should not be assumed that there some level of consumption that causes no harm or is beneficial (as previously believed). That is what the phrase "no amount is safe" commonly means in medicine. It is a purely medical recommendation.

This is totally separate from a dietary guideline, which would weigh the risks of alcohol against the social reality of it's consumption. That is the way that you seem to be interpreting it.

Also I'm not the person you responded to originally, but interestingly it seems like arsenic, in tiny quantities, is actually essential to our biology.

[allturtles]

> any amount of alcohol consumption causes some amount of harm

There is no guarantee that you will suffer harm from a single drink. What it really means is that any amount of alcohol consumption carries some (possibly minute) risk of harm. This is not, IMO, equivalent to "unsafe", which generally means something well outside the bounds of normal risks that most people already take on in their everyday lives.

If we accepted that "some risk of harm" = unsafe, we would have to describe using the stairs as unsafe, taking a shower as unsafe, putting up Christmas lights as unsafe, etc.

[tomtheelder]

And medically those are unsafe. The crucial part, though, is that that's not at all to say you shouldn't do them. You are simply using a different understanding of the word safe than they are. This is a medical brief aimed at experts who should have no trouble understanding what claims are and are not being made.

This is not a lifestyle or dietary recommendation. This is not a cost benefit analysis. This is a medical brief that states that no amount of consumption is safe. The takeaway categorically should not be that we should all reduce our intake to zero, which seems to be how folks are interpreting this.

For what it's worth, I say all this as a regular drinker who has no intention of ceasing drinking.

[pasabagi]

What about: 'No amount of smoke inhalation is safe for the lungs'?

Obviously, if you live in a city, you're going to find yourself inhaling smoke from time to time, but it's still the case that it should be avoided. It's not extreme to think of alcohol as 'always negative' but also to accept it's a common and basically unavoidable toxin.

[PaulDavisThe1st]

That's a hard argument to make. "2nd hand smoke" is (for now) unavoidable (though has decreased dramatically over the last decade or two). "2nd hand alcohol" is not really a thing at all. We choose to drink it, or we choose not to (ignoring heinous acts of coerced drinking).

[djur]

Having a fireplace, barbecue, outdoor fire pit, or going camping with a campfire, are all situations where people intentionally choose to engage in activities that cause them to inhale smoke. Those activities might contribute to a healthy lifestyle in the whole. Similarly, social activities that include alcohol consumption can be analyzed as a whole, without the pretense that they can always be made 'dry'. There is no 'dry' wine tasting.

[slothtrop]

Indeed, and cyanide as well for instance. Neither are "necessary" either. I don't think necessity has any bearing on the discussion. Ultimately the question is whether moderate alcohol consumption poses a significant health risk, and "no safe amount" avoids answering this.

[ericd]

I’m guessing I’m not alone in saying that some of the most enjoyable, memorable, and positively impactful nights of my life were because of alcohol.

To call ingesting it in any amount “bad” is way too reductive.

[AlwaysRock]

Which is why I defined bad. Meth addicts experience utter bliss and euphoria while high. I've had lots of great experiences drunk or while drinking. I've also thoroughly enjoyed utterly gorging myself on unhealthy or excessive amounts of food. I've driven too fast, stayed up too late, and generally done lots of things that are bad for me because they felt good or lead to some type of, at least in that moment, good experience.

It doenst mean those things were not bad for me. It's about being able to admit that those things were bad for my health regardless of if I decided the benefit outweighed the cost. Many people thing the cost of consuming alcohol is lower than it is and that the benefits are far greater than they are. I've had plenty of incredible experiences without booze too. In hindsight there were plenty of things I would have enjoyed just as much, if not more, if I didnt think I needed alcohol to make the experiences better in some way.

[jghn]

It's because for years there was a claim that low levels of consumption was beneficial, not just safe. They're working to undo that conventional wisdom.

I don't recall there ever being a time when people espoused short drives as being beneficial for one's health.

[slothtrop]

To quibble, something can be "unsafe" i.e. harm you in certain ways, and also carry health benefits, since "health benefits" does not merely translate to "life expectancy". In fact for the study in question, compare impact on different organs; for some there is a harm, for others a marginal benefit (if I remember correctly).

This is the problem with pop sci headlines, they don't give you context. If one study finds that some compound has potential benefits in one specific physiological region, the news will read "x is good for your health", and vise versa.

Looking at just mortality, we can more accurately say, for those touting this study, "there is no evidence alcohol consumption improves mortality", and also "low alcohol consumption may weakly worsen mortality rates".

[wing-_-nuts]

A lot of studies on alcohol and mortality show a J curve where mortality actually drops, and then starts rising until it's back at baseline at 4 drinks / day. Now, I am not saying that it's safe to drink 4 drinks per day. That's a lot. What I am saying is that is the point where cardiovascular benefits seem to be outweighed by the increased cancer risks. Many studies have called the J curve into question due to the 'sick quitter' effect, but you have to realize that by trying to correct for that effect they are often just adding a fudge factor to the numbers. Alcohol is a very hard subject to study because it's always self reported, and thus almost always under reported.

[GekkePrutser]

Correlation doesn't equate to causation. Perhaps the people that sit down with a glass of wine at night are the ones simply taking a slower pace in life and have less stress as a result.

However be that as it may I'm not giving up alcohol lol. I only drink occasionally and I enjoy it and I simply don't care if it's bad for me. Lots of things are bad for us.

[deltaonefour]

It's not exaggerated. Your claim of "no amount of driving is safe" is also not hyperbolic, it's real. You drive, you're at risk.

What's going on here is that the previous conclusion was not "no level of alcohol consumption is safe." The previous conclusion was "some alcohol is good for your heart." All this new conclusion says is that this is no longer the case.

Nobody lives their life off the mantra "no amount of driving is safe"... That would be crazy but it would be entirely wrong to say that, "some amount of driving improves your life expectancy" when this is clearly not the case.

Hence the need for the WHF to take an official stance on this. It's a data driven conclusion, but you of course need to be the judge about what you need to do with that conclusion.

[slothtrop]

> What's going on here is that the previous conclusion was not "no level of alcohol consumption is safe." The previous conclusion was "some alcohol is good for your heart."

Something can be deemed "unsafe" and good for your heart. There's more than one internal organ. The word "unsafe" doesn't provide context.

[deltaonefour]

Here's a better way to put it. Alcohol never was good for your heart. IN fact it's bad for your heart and does nothing good for your body. That is what the WHF means when you ignore all the semantic pedantry.

[avgcorrection]

That’s a rubbish comparison.

Of course no amount of driving is safe—that’s commonsensical. You always have a chance of getting harmed when you decide to drive a car. But driving a car has a clear utility which is non-optional in a lot of cases. The utility of recreational alcohol use is, on the other hand, more akin to joyriding—so similar to a completely optional subset of car driving.

[pcrh]

It's impossible to eat many foods without ingesting ethanol, including bread. The advice that "no amount" of ethanol is safe is ludicrous, including from a biological perspective, as the human body is well equipped to safely handle ingestion of ethanol in moderate amounts.

[avgcorrection]

That’s an illuminating argument and not at all just a technicality that disproves nothing. Consider me enlightened.

[zelphirkalt]

That is a weird comparison. No one is forcing you to drink alcohol, but you might be forced to drive to the office. One is avoidable, the other one is not. Or if you want to be even more precise: One is easily avoidable and the other might cost you your job.

[chucksta]

No one is forcing you to drive to work either. Many people in don't even have a license, yet make it to work each day. You even said it, "might be forced" meaning there are possibilities in which you aren't.

[avgcorrection]

Cue we get into the weeds bickering over the analogy for the rest of the thread.

[pnt12]

If you live outside the city, you basically are. In my home town, transportation is limited, eg a bus in the morning and one in the afternoon, both which can be late, and the stops are kilometers apart and the sidewalks are shitty. So when I'm there, I take my car everywhere, as does everyone else.

But when I lived in a big city, the opposite happened: parking was expensive and the traffic sucked, so I always took the bus and subway.

Let's not make blank statements about transportation, as it differs so much from one place from another.

[soperj]

Still aren't forced to drive. Walk, bike, catch an earlier bus etc.

[chucksta]

No one is forcing you to work either

[thebean11]

How is that relevant? If you want change it to "no amount of driving to the bowling alley is safe".

[zelphirkalt]

I have seen many people use such comparisions, which do not match up, to justify unhealthy behavior for themselves, shutting themselves out from proper reasoning. That is how it is relevant. I am saying: Do not fool yourself using such arguments.

Also the comparison you now brought up is again not a good argument: It doesn't matter, whether there are unnecessary rides. The argument is, that there are mandatory ones for people, while there is no mandatory thing that forces you to drink alcohol. Or at least there should not be and in reality there are probably very few.

[thebean11]

Sure there are mandatory rides, but the argument doesn't hinge on those..you can consider only nonessential rides, and drinking. Both are totally optional, what is your issue with that comparison?

[zelphirkalt]

I have no issue with the comparison of nonessential rides. I want to note though, that the original argument was plainly about "pulling out of your driveway".

So if one does nonessential rides only, then yes, the comparison might work. I think that is quite a special case of a situation though, which I cannot simply interpret into what the original argument said. I mean, I am not here to interpret a working version into something, that in its generality does not work as a comparison. I rather read things as they are written and try not to add things.

We could speculate about how many people use a car mostly to be able to get to the location of work or how many people use a car for essential reasons. We are getting further away from the actual matter of discussion though, which is drinking alcohol and that not being requried at all.

[lmm]

Driving is absolutely avoidable. Being willing to drive might help you get a better job - but so might being willing to drink.

(Far more importantly, drinking is actually enjoyable, whereas commute-style driving is a chore. Considering a job to be somehow more important than a social occasion is putting the cart before the horse)

[mrfusion]

Plus driving to buy food definitely makes you live longer.

[zelphirkalt]

> […] So what? That doesn't mean it's significant.

It is the question, how significant it is. Then there is the question, what level of significance will make a person reconsider their consumption.

However, the statement that no amount is truly safe, if it is correct, means, that in general alcohol is an unnecessary risk. There is no need to drink it and no good for ones heart comes of it in terms of biology. What society does with this info is up to all of us.

[tarboreus]

This is only true if you assume or demonstrate that alcohol has no benefits to individuals that outweigh the downside risk to health. As the downside appears to be relatively small, this seems like a fairly difficult bar to clear.

[tomtheelder]

No, their statement is correct regardless of the benefits. This brief isn't a cost benefit analysis. It's not a dietary guideline. It's a statement of medical fact (based on current research, anyway): that no amount of alcohol is safe for cardiovascular health.

There may well be benefits to alcohol consumption, but those are entirely irrelevant here.